Ireland: Kenny defends Anglo wind-down probe

After days of silence over allegations of favourable deals for some clients of the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation, Mr Kenny insisted there was no evidence of wrongdoing but a judge-led inquiry was needed.

The effective U-turn was taken last night despite parliamentary questions being asked for months over the sale of the Siteserv company from the old Anglo books to billionaire Denis O’Brien.

Documents released by the Department of Finance – only discovered and released at the same time as the announcement of the inquiry – revealed that the sale went through in March 2012 with a debt write-off worth 119 million euro. The figure was previously thought to be about 100 million euro.